# Aarti Sequeira
**Aarti Sequeira** (born 1978) is an Indian-American cook, television personality, journalist, and cookbook author best known for winning season six of *The Next Food Network Star* in 2010 and for hosting the [Food Network](https://www.edgepedia.org/food-network) series *Aarti Party*, on which she prepared American favorites seasoned with Indian flavors and techniques.[1](https://www.eater.com/2010/8/15/6722915/aarti-sequeira-next-food-network-star-season-six-winner) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) Her signature style, which she describes as American favorites with an Indian soul, draws on a childhood that spanned Mumbai, Dubai, and a British school, and on a first career as a CNN news producer.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born | 1978 in Bombay (now Mumbai), India; raised in Dubai, United Arab Emirates[3](https://www.famousbirthdays.com/people/aarti-sequeira.html) |
| Education | Bachelor's degree, Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University, 2000[4](https://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/winter2010/alumnilife/close-ups/aarti_sequeira.html) |
| Breakthrough | Winner, season six of *The Next Food Network Star*, 2010, beating finalists Tom Pizzica and Herb Mesa[1](https://www.eater.com/2010/8/15/6722915/aarti-sequeira-next-food-network-star-season-six-winner) |
| Own shows | *Aarti Party* (Food Network), *Taste in Translation* and *Drop 5 Lbs* (Cooking Channel), *Hidden Eats*[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) • [5](https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/contributor/aarti-sequeira/) |
| Competition wins | *Chopped All-Stars*, *Cutthroat Kitchen All-Stars*, and *Guy's Grocery Games*[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) |
| Cookbook | *Aarti Paarti: An American Kitchen with an Indian Soul* (Grand Central, 2014), foreword by Ree Drummond[5](https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/contributor/aarti-sequeira/) |
| Family | Married actor Brendan McNamara in 2003; daughters Eliyah and Moses[3](https://www.famousbirthdays.com/people/aarti-sequeira.html) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) |
## Early life and journalism career
Sequeira was born into a traditional Indian Catholic family with roots in Mangalore, a town on the Konkan coast, and spent most of her early years in Dubai.[6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira) • [7](https://www.thekitchn.com/aarti-sequeira-easter-food-traditions-23309828) Her food upbringing mixed her mother's homemade curries and flatbreads with the spit-roasted shawarmas the family ate every Friday, and she has described the Mangalorean Catholic community's Lent and Easter traditions, including fasting before Easter church services and a special breakfast afterward.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) • [7](https://www.thekitchn.com/aarti-sequeira-easter-food-traditions-23309828)
It was during the first [Gulf War](https://www.edgepedia.org/gulf-war) that she decided to pursue journalism. She moved to Chicago to attend [Northwestern University](https://www.edgepedia.org/northwestern-university)'s Medill School of Journalism, graduating in 2000, and then worked as a producer for CNN in Chicago and later New York, covering everything from economic reports to the plight of firefighters after 9/11.[4](https://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/winter2010/alumnilife/close-ups/aarti_sequeira.html) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) Her production credits also include *Sand and Sorrow*, an HBO film on the [Darfur genocide](https://www.edgepedia.org/darfur-genocide) that Peabody Award winner Paul Freedman directed and George Clooney narrated.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio)
## From blog to Food Network Star
After moving to Los Angeles as a newlywed, Sequeira enrolled in the New School of Cooking in Culver City in 2007 and staged under the James Beard Award-winning chef Suzanne Goin at Lucques.[8](https://news.stonybrook.edu/diversity/food-network-star-aarti-sequeira-spices-up-asian-heritage-month-program/) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) That year she launched the online cooking variety show *Aarti Paarti* and the blog aartipaarti.com, with the tagline "eat. giggle. repeat.", filmed by her husband in their Los Angeles home; the episodes mixed cooking with comic segments of her playing the ukulele, belly dancing, and juggling.[4](https://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/winter2010/alumnilife/close-ups/aarti_sequeira.html) • [6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira)
At her husband's urging she sent an audition video to *Food Network Star* and was called in immediately.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) Competing on the sixth season in 2010, she was described by the *Houston Chronicle* as an early fan favorite, survived two trips to the bottom group over ten weeks and eighteen challenges, and won an [Iron Chef](https://www.edgepedia.org/iron-chef)-style cook-off in the penultimate episode that drew praise from judges [Cat Cora](https://www.edgepedia.org/cat-cora), Bobby Flay, Masaharu Morimoto, and [Michael Symon](https://www.edgepedia.org/michael-symon).[6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira) In the finale on 15 August 2010 she beat the other finalists, Tom Pizzica and Herb Mesa, to win the season and her own series.[1](https://www.eater.com/2010/8/15/6722915/aarti-sequeira-next-food-network-star-season-six-winner)
## Television career
**Aarti Party.** Food Network launched her six-episode series *Aarti Party* on 22 August 2010, a week after her win.[6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira) The half-hour show showed easy ways to cook American favorites enhanced by Indian spices and techniques, and it was the network's first series built around [Indian cuisine](https://www.edgepedia.org/indian-cuisine); to fill it she had to create forty recipes in a month.[6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira) • [9](https://ufdcimages.uflib.ufl.edu/UF/E0/04/98/25/00001/MATWICK_K.pdf) The show was renewed for a second season in December 2010 and ran for three seasons, with reruns on the Cooking Channel.[4](https://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/winter2010/alumnilife/close-ups/aarti_sequeira.html) • [9](https://ufdcimages.uflib.ufl.edu/UF/E0/04/98/25/00001/MATWICK_K.pdf)
**Later shows.** From January 2013 she hosted *Taste in Translation* on the Cooking Channel, a series in which she cooked dishes from around the world to show how food unites cultures, and co-hosted *Drop 5 Lbs* with Good Housekeeping; she has also hosted the travel series *Hidden Eats*.[10](https://www.washingtonpost.com/express/wp/2013/01/04/face-time-aarti-sequeira/) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) As a judge and competitor she has become a regular on *Guy's Grocery Games*, where host [Guy Fieri](https://www.edgepedia.org/guy-fieri) nicknamed her "the spice queen", and has judged *Holiday Wars*, *Halloween Wars*, *Christmas Cookie Challenge*, and *Cooks vs. Cons*, cooked on *Guy's Ranch Kitchen*, and appeared on *Selena + Chef*, where in November 2020 she helped [Selena Gomez](https://www.edgepedia.org/selena-gomez) cook her first [Thanksgiving](https://www.edgepedia.org/thanksgiving) turkey.[6](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) • [11](https://aartisequeira.com/featured-on/) She is also a repeat competition winner, having taken *Chopped All-Stars*, *Cutthroat Kitchen All-Stars*, and *Guy's Grocery Games*.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio)
## Writing
Sequeira's first cookbook, *Aarti Paarti: An American Kitchen with an Indian Soul*, was published by Grand Central in 2014 with a foreword by [Ree Drummond](https://www.edgepedia.org/ree-drummond).[5](https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/contributor/aarti-sequeira/) Reviewers described it as part cookbook and part memoir, an exuberant mashup of her Indian homeland, international childhood, and American adulthood, with recipes such as [French onion soup](https://www.edgepedia.org/french-onion-soup) with paneer and Pretzel-Fried Steak with Mango-Onion Gravy; a Portland Press Herald tester found the recipes imaginative, carefully written, and by and large reliable.[12](https://www.pressherald.com/2014/10/29/cookbook-review-aarti-paarti-an-american-kitchen-with-an-indian-soul/) On Goodreads the book holds a 4.27 average from 288 ratings.[13](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20454658-aarti-paarti)
She has written other food books as well. Inspired by her mother's recipe journal, she published *My Family Recipe Journal: With Prayers and Scriptures* in 2021, a fill-in volume encouraging home cooks to preserve their family's food history, and she later created *Unwind: A Devotional Cookbook for the Harried and Hungry* with DaySpring, pairing 50 devotions with 50 recipes.[14](https://magazine.northwestern.edu/people/food-network-star-aarti-sequeira-shares-her-favorite-recipes-tandoori-chicken-raita) • [15](https://aartisequeira.com/home/) She also penned a nationally syndicated Associated Press column, "World's Fare", teaching readers to use international-aisle ingredients in simple weeknight dishes.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio)
## Personal life and advocacy
Sequeira married the actor Brendan McNamara, a fellow Northwestern alumnus, in 2003, and they have two daughters, Eliyah and Moses.[3](https://www.famousbirthdays.com/people/aarti-sequeira.html) • [2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) After overcoming [postpartum depression](https://www.edgepedia.org/postpartum-depression) following the births of both daughters, she became an advocate for women battling the condition, and as a practicing Christian she also speaks to women of faith about overcoming fear and what she calls the sacred nature of breaking bread.[2](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio) She later moved with her family from Los Angeles to [Raleigh, North Carolina](https://www.edgepedia.org/raleigh-north-carolina), where she designed a camera-ready kitchen around an emerald tile backsplash for filming her Instagram cooking videos.[16](https://www.foodnetwork.com/magazine/articles/star-kitchen-aarti-sequeira)
## References
1. [Aarti Sequeira: Next Food Network Star Season Six Winner, Eater (16 August 2010)](https://www.eater.com/2010/8/15/6722915/aarti-sequeira-next-food-network-star-season-six-winner)
2. [Aarti Sequeira Bio, Food Network](https://www.foodnetwork.com/profiles/talent/aarti-sequeira/bio)
3. [Aarti Sequeira, Famous Birthdays](https://www.famousbirthdays.com/people/aarti-sequeira.html)
4. [Aarti Sequeira: Party with Aarti, Northwestern Magazine (Winter 2010)](https://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/winter2010/alumnilife/close-ups/aarti_sequeira.html)
5. [Aarti Sequeira, Hachette Book Group](https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/contributor/aarti-sequeira/)
6. [Aarti Sequeira: Food Network Star, Husband & Cookbook, Rapture Muse](https://rapturemuse.com/persons/aarti-sequeira)
7. [Food Network Star Aarti Sequeira on Her Easter Food Traditions, The Kitchn (14 April 2022)](https://www.thekitchn.com/aarti-sequeira-easter-food-traditions-23309828)
8. [Food Network Star Aarti Sequeira Spices Up Asian Heritage Month Program, SBU News](https://news.stonybrook.edu/diversity/food-network-star-aarti-sequeira-spices-up-asian-heritage-month-program/)
9. [Biography of Celebrity Chefs, K. Matwick dissertation, University of Florida](https://ufdcimages.uflib.ufl.edu/UF/E0/04/98/25/00001/MATWICK_K.pdf)
10. [Face Time: Aarti Sequeira, The Washington Post (4 January 2013)](https://www.washingtonpost.com/express/wp/2013/01/04/face-time-aarti-sequeira/)
11. [Featured On, aartisequeira.com](https://aartisequeira.com/featured-on/)
12. [Cookbook Review: 'Aarti Paarti: An American Kitchen with an Indian Soul', Portland Press Herald (29 October 2014)](https://www.pressherald.com/2014/10/29/cookbook-review-aarti-paarti-an-american-kitchen-with-an-indian-soul/)
13. [Aarti Paarti: An American Kitchen with an Indian Soul, Goodreads](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20454658-aarti-paarti)
14. [Aarti Sequeira Shares Her Favorite Recipes, Northwestern Magazine (14 November 2022)](https://magazine.northwestern.edu/people/food-network-star-aarti-sequeira-shares-her-favorite-recipes-tandoori-chicken-raita)
15. [Aarti Sequeira, aartisequeira.com](https://aartisequeira.com/home/)
16. [Star Kitchen: Aarti Sequeira, Food Network Magazine](https://www.foodnetwork.com/magazine/articles/star-kitchen-aarti-sequeira)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Food, customs, and everyday culture › Food, cooking and hospitality › Restaurants, chefs, and culinary practice › Chefs, culinary professions, and hospitality › Television and celebrity chefs › American television chefs*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 12, 2026; Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license